16. Typographical conventions vary from one language to the next

Many office staff and non-translators are unaware of this, or do not take it seriously, and may automatically "adjust" foreign-language texts to bring them into line with their own standards.

Thus, French usually has a space between a word and the punctuation mark that follows. In German, nouns take capital letters. In Spanish and French, neither months nor days of the week take an initial capital. Oh, and never type just an "n" when Spanish requires an "ñ". A bilingual banner in the US celebrated "100 anos" of municipal history. Año is year; ano is anus.

"No Electioneering allowed within 100 feet of a polling place," said another sign translated into Spanish. The monolingual typesetter opted to leave out accents when using full caps in Spanish, and composed "ELECTORAL BELL" (CAMPANA) instead of "ELECTORAL CAMPAIGN" (CAMPAÑA).

Even if each typesetting glitch is minor or seems insignificant, the cumulative effect is to put foreign-language readers off, at best. Respect the typographical conventions of the language you are working into.